Chicago releases new videos from scene of Laquan McDonald’s shooting

CHICAGO (AP) — Small groups of demonstrators gathered throughout the day Wednesday to protest the death of a black teen shot 16 times by a white police officer, and they urged supporters to join them in trying to shut down Chicago’s famous Michigan Avenue shopping district during the Black Friday shopping bonanza. US president Barack Obama has said he was “deeply disturbed” by the video footage of a white Chicago policeman shooting dead a black teenager that has been released to the public.Crowds have been flocking to the streets of Chicago since Tuesday night, after the forced release of a dashcam video, which unveiled details of McDonald’s death on October 20, 2014. The graphic footage, released on Tuesday shortly after police officer Jason Van Dyke was charged with first-degree murder, has reignited impassioned debate about the use of force by law enforcement in the US.

The police dashboard camera videos also shed new light on how the events unfolded leading up to McDonald’s death by showing police response to the incident from new perspectives. A young man, 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, jogs along the middle of a road at night and slows to a brisk walk as he sees two police cars that have stopped ahead of him. Frustrated with police and prosecutors’ reluctance to charge Van Dyke with a murder, protesters are accusing law enforcement of covering up the killing of McDonald. He swerves away from the two policemen who emerge from one of them, then briefly turns to them; whereupon one fires, and the young man staggers and falls to the ground.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s Law Department released the videos from five separate police vehicles to the Chicago Tribune on Wednesday in response to an open records request. Turkey has released audio recordings of what it says are the Turkish military’s warnings to the pilot of the Russian plane that was shot down at the border with Syria. The videos, released on DVDs, included the one widely circulated publicly Tuesday that shows the most complete coverage of the shooting released to date. The recordings made available to The Associated Press on Thursday indicate that the plane was warned several times that it was approaching Turkey’s airspace and asked to change course.

Prosecutors and Chicago officials have come under intense criticism for trying to block the release of the video and taking so long to press charges against Van Dyke. Protesters accuse her of “continued protection of violent and corrupt police officers.” Activists want a special prosecutor to be appointed for McDonald’s case as well as for all other potential killings by police which may occur in the future.

On top of that, #LaquanMcDonald protesters demand the UN to immediately investigate the CPD and the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office for violating the human rights of black people. Mr McDonald, who was black and had been spotted earlier that evening trying to break into parked cars, and was carrying a small knife, died in an ambulance soon after. Prosecutors said Van Dyke, who joined Chicago police in 2001, opened fire just 30 seconds after his vehicle pulled up to the scene with McDonald and six seconds after stepping out of it.

Kenyan authorities estimated that as many as 1.4 million people could turn out for Thursday’s Mass at the University of Nairobi campus and surrounding parks. In a Facebook post, the president said he is asking Americans to “keep those who’ve suffered tragic loss in our thoughts and prayers” this Thanksgiving “and to be thankful for the overwhelming majority of men and women in uniform who protect our communities with honor.” Lamon Reccord yells at a Chicago police officer, “Shoot me 16 times,” during a march through Chicago on Wednesday. (Charles Rex Arbogast, The Associated Press) But if that was one reason for the more modest protests that followed its release, the main one is that Mr Van Dyke seems likely to be held accountable for his actions.

According to that order, the in-car video system will automatically engage audio and video recording when the vehicle’s emergency lights are activated. Pope Francis told Christian and Muslim leaders in Kenya on Thursday that they have little choice but to engage in dialogue to guard against the “barbarous” Islamic extremist attacks that have struck Kenya, saying they need to be “prophets of peace” in a world sown with hatred. The fatal shooting put Van Dyke’s record in the force under scrutiny, as it emerged that he had at least 20 complaints filed against him but was never disciplined.

Francis met with a small group of Kenya’s faith leaders before celebrating his first public Mass on the continent, a joyful, rain-soaked celebration attended by tens of thousands of faithful, including Kenya’s president. The latest case has been particularly painful for Edward Nance, who won a US$350,000 civil judgment for injuries sustained when he was arrested by Van Dyke and his partner in 2007. The videos, including the one from Van Dyke’s vehicle, did not include any audio of officers talking, either in the vehicles or over police radios, raising questions about why sirens outside the vehicles are audible but voices and other sounds from inside the vehicle are not. On his first full day in Africa, Francis received a raucous welcome from the crowd as he zoomed around in his open-sided popemobile, some 10,000 police providing security.

Mr Nance — who worked at a cable company and as a high-school sports referee — told investigators that Van Dyke’s partner slammed his head on the hood of his car and that Van Dyke violently handcuffed him and tossed him into a squad car. The Tribune put those questions to the Police Department, the office of Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez and the Law Department early Wednesday afternoon. The Independent Police Review Board dismissed the complaint because there were “no independent witnesses” and “no way to determine” the cause of Mr Nance’s injuries, local media reported. Others waited in queues 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) deep to get close to the venue, but the turnout appeared far less than the 1.4 million that Kenyan authorities had predicted after declaring Thursday a national holiday.

However, in a news conference Tuesday before releasing the now-viral video that shows McDonald’s shooting, Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy was asked whether there was any audio on that footage. In his homily, Francis appealed for traditional family values, calling for Kenyans to “resist practices which foster arrogance in men, hurt or demean women and threaten the life of the innocent unborn.” The African church is among the most conservative in the world, and African bishops have been at the forefront in insisting that traditional church teachings on marriage and sexuality, and its opposition to abortion, be strongly emphasized. Asked whether the police cameras were supposed to have sound, McCarthy responded, “There’s supposed to be (audio), and it’s supposed to happen at a couple different instances. “This is one of the things that we are working on.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — With Washington set to send billions of dollars in fresh aid to Afghanistan despite the military drawdown, the U.S. official in charge of auditing assistance programs says “it’s not too late” to address the fraud and mismanagement that has bedeviled the 14-year effort to rebuild the country. The video shows the teen appear to move slightly in the street with streams of blood trailing from his body. ▪ Two other videos from a pair of other police vehicles that drove up near the incident but appeared to be quickly dispatched to help set up a perimeter and control traffic. But John Sopko, who has spent more than three years probing U.S.-funded projects as the special investigator general for Afghanistan reconstruction (SIGAR), said the U.S. government is partly to blame for the misused funds. The absence of any recorded discussions from officers in any of the five vehicles for which videos were released makes it impossible to discern what the officers might have discussed in their cars on the run-up to the shooting of McDonald. Each also starts at different points in the sequence of events, with one squad car’s video not starting until after it’s already parked near an ambulance at the scene.

NEW YORK (AP) — As millions of Americans prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving, security will be tight in New York City with a record number of police officers patrolling the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. City officials have said there are no known, credible threats against New York following the recent attacks in Paris and a video purportedly produced by ISIS that contained video clips of Times Square. They’re doing what they do to try and create fear, to try and change us.” BOSTON (AP) — John Howland may not be as famous as William Bradford, John Carver and Myles Standish, notable passengers on the Mayflower that landed in Massachusetts in 1620.

His remarkable story is the subject of a new children’s book, “The Boy Who Fell Off the Mayflower, or John Howland’s Good Fortune,” by Irish illustrator and author P.J. A nation that just months ago was hailed as an example of how to follow through with budget austerity measures has become a new source of concern in Europe. A left-wing coalition has unseated a center-right government that introduced the deep spending cuts and steep tax hikes demanded since 2011 by creditors during Portugal’s 78 billion-euro ($82.6 billion) bailout. South Korea said Thursday it fined Volkswagen $12.3 million and ordered recalls of 125,522 diesel vehicles after the government found their emissions tests were rigged. Hong Dong Gon, a director at the Ministry of Environment, said in a live television broadcast that the ministry will continue investigating 30,000 other Volkswagen diesel cars for which it did not find evidence of emissions cheating.

South Korea’s government launched investigations last month after the German automaker admitted that it rigged U.S. tests so it would appear that its diesel-powered cars were emitting fewer nitrogen oxides, which can contribute to ozone buildup and respiratory illness. As the scandal continues to expand, it said last week that the company will cut its spending by 1 billion euros ($1.07 billion) next year and “strictly prioritize” investments as it shores up its finances to deal with its emissions-rigging scandal. It has already set aside 6.7 billion euros ($7.4 billion) to cover the costs of recalling those vehicles but experts say the total cost including fines could be much more. The South Korean ministry found that emissions from Tiguan diesel vehicles using EA189 engines breached standards when the car was not under the usual test conditions, such as when the air conditioner was on or when the car accelerated. LOS ANGELES (AP) — Three of the radio personality Casey Kasem’s children and his brother sued his widow on Wednesday, claiming her actions led to his death in 2014.

The wrongful death lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court accuses Jean Kasem of elder abuse and inflicting emotional distress on Kasem’s children from a previous marriage by restricting access to their father before his death.